Holding pre-hung man doors closed

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I have to solve a problem that I have never been up against before. We are building cabinets for a mudroom. Part of the project utilizes a pair of 30 x 80 pre-hung closet doors. A washer & dryer will live behind these doors.

My challenge is to figure out how to keep the doors closed at where they meet. We want to be able to open the doors like they were cabinets, just a simple knob on the stile where doors meet.

Ordinarily I would expect that one of the doors to be fixed in position and the second door latched to the first one. In this case we want to be able to open either door first without un-fixing the other door.

Does anybody know of a hardware system that is designed to do this? Are rare earth magnets my only choice?

Top door edge ball springs are the typical solution to this. One in the top of each door at the meeting edge.

The problem with ball spring catches though is that with seasonal wood movement the latch moves up and down since it is attached to the head jamb. I've resolved this issue by using a dual latch system.

After the doors are hung and the ball spring catches installed insert a 5/8" to 3/4" disk magnet into the top edge of the door. This is best located on center in the edge of the door and between the ball catch and the meeting edge of the door. At only 3/4" wide there is usually plenty of room to do this.

Then in the door jamb install an opposite pole magnet as close as possible to the stop. It needs to be in line with the magnet in the door but further back towards the stop.

When the door closes the ball spring catch will do most of the work. However if there is a little play in the ball catch sitting in the strike bowl the magnets take over and suck the door back to the stops.

I've used this solution to get rid of rattling double doors. A magnet alone will allow the door to swing open too easily. The magnet combined with the ball spring catch though holds door edges in place.

Thanks for the detailed explanation.
I've been staring at google pics of this hardware till my eyes are bleeding. I like the idea of rare earth magnet backup.

The automatic flush bolt that Jim recommends is pretty interesting. As I understand it the bolt on inactive door latches it into position as the swinging door is closed and disengages inactive door when swinging door is opened. That is very clever. I hope I can find something on youtube to better explain this.

I also like Scott's $95 solution. This is a little pricey for a magnet but way less expensive than a call back.

For many years, the standard for us was the same as elsewhere - the Ives type roller catch, ball projection/height and spring pressure were both adjustable, though most installers were unaware of the adjustments, and probable no homeowner was ever made aware of them.

Then along came roller catches with adjustability, and the roller helped break the friction.

Both of the above benefited from accurate jigging/installation, so the divot in the catch plate would hold the door back tight to the stop.

As the doors get larger and heavier, the latches seemed deficient. So on our larger doors we went with rare earth magnets just like Bernie suggests. We would double up the magnets and do without the mechanical catch. Now we are looking for a way to set one half of each magnet set on an adjuster so that can be set as needed.

The touch latch suggested is the best of the lot, and works well. However, they can get out of cycle and confuse some users (it doesn't take much...) so we prefer other solutions.

Active/Passive pairs are a nice way to go, and a t-astragal can be used to blind the gap. They can still utilize the magnetic catches, but do not give the choice of opening one door or the other. I think edge bolts or extension bolts would be clumsy and inconvenient.

I have used some modified casement window latches that have sliding bars - internal cremone type latches - that engage the only head, similar to exterior multipoint latches. These are really nice, but add a lot of expense and install labor. Also if they get out of cycle, they can damage casings/jambs.

The hardest part is explaining all these to the owner/builder/designer whose job it is to select and specify.

What is nice about the system I came up with is you get the feel of the door latching as the spring ball enters the strike plate. This gives a traditional feel to closing the door.

Then the magnets just give a rearward pull to the door, hugging it back to the stop. The magnets never touch so there is no need for adjustment. The magnet on the top of the door is offset outwards from the one inserted into the jamb. The two magnets pulling towards each other draw the door into the stop.

I personally don't like touch latch systems on full size doors. One can get used to the idea of pressing on a cabinet door to open it. But a full size door is traditionally grabbed by the handle and pulled open. Having to push on the door to get it to swing out seems counter intuitive.

This is an interesting discussion. There are some things here I never considered.

I agree with BH about the tactile experience. Our lizard brains tell us the door is closed because it closed properly. The dynamics of how to make this happen, however, still elude me. The really sad part is that I am probably not going to be able to amortize all these training costs.

BH, what do you mean by "opposite pole magnet"? I usually work with rare earth magnets that I get from Lee Valley hardware. The magnets themselves install in a metal cup that is screwed to the wood. The other side is just a metal disk

If anybody has any pictures of how this hardware looks installed I would love to see them. As David points most of the work is building the comprehension.

The magnets are the Neodymium Rare Earth type. The ones I used are about 1/8" thick x 5/8" diameter with a chamfered center hole for a flat head screw.

I drilled a 5/8" dia x 1/8" deep hole in the top edge of the door and in the face of the jamb just in front of the stop lined up with the door magnet location......but again.....recessed rearward. The 1/8" deep hole allows the disc magnets to be flush with the surface.

The magnet recessed into the overhead jamb is chamfered hole down so the visible flat head screw is flush. The one in the top of the door is also chamfered hole down so this one has a pan head screw. This is the orientation for the 2 magnets to attract to one another as vs. repel apart.

The magnets don't really hold the door closed. The spring ball catch does that. The magnets pull the door to the stop with enough force to gently hold it there. This keeps the doors from rattling around due to the slop in the spring ball catch design. I came up with this solution to solve the issue of the doors rattling in the breeze so to speak.

The magnet system alone won't do the job. If you push a magnetic catch door closed with enough force it just bounces back open. That is why the combination of spring ball catch and magnetic pull works better than one or the other alone.

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